Toil It
Honoring Our War Heroes Was So Easy.
wet leaf
Up early, the rains were already pounding the house, the gutter and downspout on the stoop (it's hardly large enough to qualify as a porch) were clogged by maple tree seeds and other leaves and debris. Normally I would get the lightweight wooden ladder out and work on the problem, but yesterday after the multiple hours of gardening that Jenni and I did Jenni took the old wooden ladder and turned it into a fire engine red garden ornament. So I wrestled the birthday present, high-tech aluminum ladder out of its cubby in my over crowded garage and extended it on the stoop and sidewalk and unclogged the blockage during the heaviest part of the storm. Jenni commented to our friend Gabe in Puerto Rico on Facebook that I was out on a metal ladder in the storm. When I came back in I said to tell him that it didn't work out.

yard3qtr
The "fresh" garden looking in from the outside.
Notice my old work ladder now a cucumber and bean ladder.
That task out to the way I made breakfast for my bride and myself, she made coffee and cut up a tasty cantaloupe and we had a fine moment or two together.

A few hours later, after busily doing nothing else of any importance I decided to download some songs from Amazon's MP3 online downloads. I also uploaded a few applications to the iPhone and played some Mike's Cards solitaire. The next major decision was snacks and what to watch on the TV. We tried to watch Quantum of Solace but this copy, like the one I bought a few weeks ago won't play on my new Blu-Ray player either. It looks like an upgrade issue and is a bummer. Everything else I have in Blu-Ray works just fine. It is an Insignia (BestBuy house brand) player and the online reviews are not to complimentary, still we ended up watching the Dark Knight and after that the season finale
not_dry_creekbed
of Castle and an Office both from the DVR. Then Jenni told me that Reaper is not coming back next season and ruined the moment. Jenni did manage a couple of trips to exchange clothes and get some stuff from the grocery store. I also managed to get outside between the rainier moments and get a few photos off, but during the whole day of laziness and self-absorption neither Jenni or I were able to drive over to Kays to return the borrowed Mantis. I want to thank all the soldiers, sailors, men and women who put their lives on the line for this country for giving me the ability to be lazy and relaxed on a holiday day off to honor them. We still live in the greatest country in the world.
Top Left: A leaf holding a micro pool of the days wet.
Bottom Right: The "Dry" Creek bed fills with water during heavy rains. The bamboo, dragon plants and various stones are supposed to simulate a dry creek.
Chuck Pace ©2009 
|
Day of the MANTIS!
m.a.n.t.i.s.
Remember 1994? Things were different then, maybe better for some, maybe not. It is in the past so the bad gets diminished in many aspects and the good get glorified, Nostalgia does that. I was waxing nostalgic during the extra hour Jenni let me lounge in bed. I was remembering, and after I got up I discovered it was 1994 I was remembering. Wax on, wax off (No I wasn't thinking about the Karate Kid, you are, I wasn't. Besides that was 1984). I remember a TV show. M.A.N.T.I.S.; (Carl Lumbly), Dr. Miles Hawkings wheelchair bound genius builds an exoskeleton suit to allow him to walk, and after a catastrophic event (oddly enough) an exoskeleton that becomes a crime fighting tool. His lovely assistant Dr. Amy Ellis was played by Gina Torres, her first role according to IMDB. Gina Torres who was Zoë Washburn in Firefly. Whedonesque. Raimiesgue: M.A.N.T.I.S. was the brain child of Sam Raimi of Evil Dead, The Spider-man franchise, Darkman and so many other films and series including this years much talked about horror flick "Drag Me To Hell!"
This post has nothing to do with that.
Today is the day of the mantis tiller, a race, a birthday celebration and much, much more. I'm heading to Kay's in a few minutes to borrow her mantis so that I can plant my peppers, tomatoes, squash, beets and cucumbers today before all the other festivities (including predicted rain). It just so happens that my mind links to the strangest of things when I am able to drift in a semi-recumbent position neither fully awake or asleep and I remembered this T.V. show. It started out being about that link, then Gina Torres. Now it's back to gardening, since I'm up and ready to go.
Chuck Pace ©2009 
|
Shrugging off Thursday's Activity
Thursday I did some chores and worked my rump off, I slept in late because I could but when I got up it was Johnny bar the door. I wrote 3 stanzas that explains. it.

Yesterday I got a little sore
I was higher than the ceiling
I was flat down on the floor
I fished inside my walls
I fished without a shore

Yesterday I realized a sonic delight
I climbed outside the walls
I reached a satellite
and got a call from deepest space
Yesterday turned out all right

Yesterday I won a drywall fight
and knocked a hole into the heavens
that won't let in any light
But the sound it made was perfect
So I listened to it throughout the night

Thursday I made 7 trips into the attic, two trips to Home depot and ran 75 feet of specialized antenna cable diagonally from one corner of my attic to the wall of my home entertainment area, then down that wall 7 feet to a custom made (by me) gang box that carried the TV cable, the XM cable and on wall speaker cords out to their respective components and back up through the attic. Friday I was so sore in my upper-body from hauling myself through the access panel in the garage that even shrugging made me wince. I never realized how often I shrug, oh well (ouch) I learned something.
Chuck Pace ©2009 
|
White Again!
Hi Ho Hi Ho, its off to shovel snow. Wednesday was everything thought it would be an so much more. I did underestimate the customer count. There were actually over a dozen consumers in the store in that snow day. barista_snowday
My Starbucks at Conseco was dead. I had never seen two baristas sit at the same time before. It was a kodak moment.
I walked to the circle and deposited some checks, and had a bowl of soup at the South Bend Chocolate Company, there was plenty of outdoor . Then back south and once again into the (thermal) breeches!
Outdoor Dining
Outdoor Dining is available year round!
After the day I was overjoyed to get home to a 40 inch high wall of plowed snow in front of my drive way (again, they honor me with this effort every time we get enough white wet to plow). Well it's a short one (Jenni doesn't seem to complain though) and I have to get to the warming car.
plowed in_again
I pay the Association to to place the streets precip in front of my drive so I can get shoveling exercise. Wah ha!
Chuck Pace ©2009 
|
Best intentions
Sometimes there is nothing you can do to salvage a craptastic day. Sometimes the stars and heavens are aligned against us an ther is nothing to do but endure the day, and hope that the next one is tilted in your favor. I hope tomorrow is the best day of the year (so far anyway).
Chuck Pace ©2009 
|
Resolution
resolution
I am not much for resolutions per se, I feel that if you are inclined to change for the better you are going to do it. That your personal resolve should be enough to guide your process. If you feel that your too weak to carry out a self adjustment without your friends chiding you if you don't then you might have forgotten that your true friends love you for who you are, they want you to be happy, and they will help you if they can but usually won't be overly judgmental to the reality that you are human. Heck most of my friends are human too, and my pets love me even more unconditionally than all but the very best of them.
I think Determination is a better thing than resolution. However the dictionary I used for the first example starts with: firmness of character or purpose, resolution. If you do not find an equitable resolution to your problems with others however, a judicial determination may be in your future. A consonance in which a dissonance is resolved indeed! So there is that.
I'm glad we had this little talk, I will attempt to be more frequent with the posted offerings but that is far from a resolution, just a little more determination to post on my part.
Chuck Pace ©2009 
|
A Ton of Bricks
It is Sunday and the recovery is well under way. I have been home and not so well since I left work on Friday at 10:30. Somewhere between Wednesday and Friday morning I came down with some wicked cold/flu symptoms. Thursday I was sniffling and sneezing a bit, Friday I went to work with an eye that would not stop watering, and ear that crackled each time I moved my jaw, and bursts of coughing that would deprive me of enough oxygen that I would be dizzy for twenty or thirty seconds after the fit was over. I called Jenni and asked her to contact our Doctor in Cumberland, within minutes I had an appointment text show up on the iPhone. I informed the powers that be that I was going to see the doctor and expecting to get a shot. I picked up Jenni so that she could have the car for a return trip and to continue her work day. At home I didn't have much time before the time. I started the truck and let it warm up for a bit, then headed off to see the wizard, or shaman or medicine man.
swallow this
My Daily Bread, O.K. so I exaggerate, but...
To get a quick appointment at a Doctor's office actually means to get an opportunity to spend a lot of time at the Doctor's office. When I arrived I had a fever of about a hundred and just over a hundred fifty pages left in the Brisingr book I have been reading for a couple of weeks off and on. When I got behind the reception wall, the, hey I've been called to a higher plane call I had about 95 pages to go. A nurse followed me into the rome and did the inner ear temperature reading, and the blood pressure arm smashing and the embarrassing weight gain mention. I grabbed the kleenex box from the other side of the desk and dug back into the final chapters of the book after her departure. When the Doctor walked in I marked the page with one of my Roberts business cards and began to tell my story of woe and dread. The Doctor told me I was to sick to get a shot, since the shot's themselves take you down before building you up. Thirty five minutes later I was at the pharmacy counter at Meijer with three (prescriptions) scripts., which I was told should take about 30 minutes. I bought movies and oranges and orange juice and Zicam while waiting. The Movies Tropic Thunder, Hancock and Hellboy 2 were watched in that order over two nights counting and today. After Meijer my next stop was Wally World for my last script, a $4 medicine. A colossal sphere with hands at the Wally drop off counter
CP_brisingr
and told me it would be 45 minutes. I went back to the Truck, grabbed the book and walked to the Steak and Shake across the parking lot. There Kathy made me feel right at home, I had 5 way Chili with cheesy fries on the side and a diet Cherry Coke. She even brought me extra napkins for my draining nasal passages and my sorry red weeping eye. While dining the iPhone counted down the minutes until I could retrieve my final meds and go home and finally rest. Kathy must have thought I was reading a very sad book because she asked what I was reading. When I said it is the third book in the Eragon Cycle I must have said it in the Ancient Language or in a Dwarfish dialect because she comprehended not a wit.

IPhone alarms and I'm back in Wally's arms. At the payment first window I stood and waited for 10 minutes to say and pay. Next they sent me consultation window to consult with a pharmacist who was currently consulting with a phone caller for another 10 or more minutes. Eventaully she came over, picked up the pouch and said, "Mr. Pace?"
"Yup." I said with a weeping eye and a sore throat and stuffy nose. This is amoxicillin, have you taken it before? "Yup."
"Do you have any questions for me?" "Nope."
Three and a half hours after I pushed through the door and into the Doctors office I was in the truck and heading home. I looked forward to crashing. Which first meant walking Charlie. Then putting the tea pot on, then taking a barrage of medicines, putting on sweats, making the tea. Walking Charlie again because he was sure it was time. I was on the couch for less than an hour when Jenni came home. I finished the book.
Chuck Pace ©2008 
|
Just Pennies a Day
pennies_dayAs I get older, and I'm doing it even as I write these simple missives, (those first 15 words were written by a younger me, I now have more experience than that foolish pre-15 word youthful version) it seems I get busier. Or to be exact it seems like the stack and list of things I haven't gotten done yet gets longer. Now I'm not talking about a bucket-list, I'm just talking about the everyday crap that comes up and it is a good idea to do stuff, the that can be put off until, stuff. The good intentions stuff. The unnoticed foundation stuff. The stuff.
Well my blogs take about 45 minutes out of each day on an average, some shorter, some longer, some.. Well as you are making me painfully aware my readers (and you know who you are) I have missed a few installments of the banality barrage that is my coexistence. 49 since my last post for you bean counters (presupposing that you labeled each day not blogged in my own uniquely chuckpace.com way as a bean, which is a stretch, possibly like a... hmm, a seed pod, but I digress) which is 36 hours and 45 minutes of not sitting in front of the computer before going in to work, or watching the game or, well usually not hitting the snooze button again.
To put it another way: I pay the hosting site service $11.00 per month to have a place to house my ranting and remarking and remembering. If I use the blog as a means of storing my ideas on a daily basis the cost is only 37 cents a day. By missing a staggering 49 days since the Big Gas Hole (now healed and resuming its previous occupation as a surface for driving and parking) I have made this post cost $18.50 ($ 8:13 in arrears + today's .37) so obviously with the tightening economy it is actually more fiscally responsible for me to post more frequently. I shall do my part to trim the waste out of my blogging expense and provide a more responsible disgorging of discourse.
Furthermore, if I manage a few posts today I can take that cost to product deficiency ratio down considerably. Two posts just $9.25 each, three, just under $6.17 each. There I have addressed the kernel computing crowd, the embryonic plant enumerators , the ripe ovule relegaters, or simply put, the bean counters.
PENNY
Chuck Pace ©2008 

Bache Processing
proctorface
So it looks like the blessed day is almost upon us. Well not us actually, Scot and Anni. There is a wedding this weekend and it will be joining Mr. Proctor and Ms. Hood. Then there is the week off honey moon and all that rot. As is the ritual there was a convening of friends at some popular watering hole or another to pass on best wishes and warnings. Last night's passage to the mouth of hell bliss was first the Chatterbox then later McNivens for dining and final warm and fuzzies (and warnings). Our wait person at McNivens was Ryan (if that really is her name) and I asked her to point the digital pixel compactor at our assemblage and capture the moment. Judging by the multi-farious faces on smile bloomage she did an excellent job.
group_mcniv
All Hail the soon to be Conquered Hero!
(l to r) Rich C. Jeff B. CP(ME) Rachel A. Mike W and C.Scott P.
Later during and the food consuming portion of our dining experiment experience I compacted a few more pixels in the same fashion. The shot of Rachel Aspy and Mike Wilson aptly demonstrates the different opinions of having an image captured. The evening was a success and at around midnight it began a whole new day as most evenings are want to do. Rich and Mike (or was it C.Scott) also sampled the Monty Python's Holy Grale, but I can not attest to the taste I had my customary Robert The Bruce and I was home long before the new day deal, but I here that rabbit was dynamite.
This wasn't a dream, it was real and the shiny black spiders were pleasantly keeping to themselves.
photo_opp_Mcniv
Oh, Picture time meets Nobody said there were going to be Pictures!

Chuck Pace ©2008 
|

Project Command
Well we did it to the best of our limited ability and finances. The big on vacation project is all but finished. I removed the carpet in the hall way on Monday. On wednesday I acid cleaned and etched the concrete floor. then I came up with a simple design for the pattern of the new stained floor, then I came up with another pattern and finally I had a pattern I could stan standing on. Yesterday it was an all day affair masking, and prepping and painting and waiting between each step. Don't get me wrong I did other things this week we were able to get in 8 episodes of Angel, and watch a rental movie during all this waiting to dry and such. So it has been a vacation. I have to be back at work on Tuesday so we still have three plus days ahead. We are using that time to visit Jenni's folks and sibs in Tennessee. Here is the images of the floor project., We will be adding a urethane sealer soon as we can figure how not to stick two cats and one blind dog in it permanently.
w_o Carpethow it is
Before and after.
Now off to the In-Laws.
Happy Fourth of July!
Chuck Pace ©2008

Chortle While You Chore
asia_lily
Asian Beauty in an Indiana side-yard ©CP'08
Since yesterdays post, the big inside project is underway. Another inside/outside project was finished and some chores are done as well. The inside/outside project was a threshold between my sanctuary and the house, literally. I have a screen door in the garage so that I can leave the garage door open and the house door open too and the animals and the insects can not go from one habitat to another without invitation. Well over the years the cats and dogs got curious about what the food guy was doing in the noisy room. Eventually the screen was damaged beyond repair and the sliding glass had to be moved down to seal the air passage.
The mini-project was to re-screen the door. Something I have never done before. How hard could it be? I bought screen material, spline (the bead that goes into the door grove and traps the screen in place) and a splining tool. Well I screwed up the first attempt, and didn't score a big hit in the second but I have the door re-hung and the screen is in place. Luckily the screen itself was big enough to do a full screen door so I had enough material to do the re-do without having to make another trip to Home Depot.
I also started the other project as I said, it is a three or four day effort I'm sure. Day one is done. Day two (today) has seen it's full effort because the concrete patch has to dry before any more can be done. Tomorrow comes the acid and the etching!
Right now you are probably asking yourself what I'm doing. To paraphrase Tom Waits, "What's He Building In There, We Have a Right to know! " Well, I'm not telling yet. Nyah, nyah neeyah, na!
weed warrior
A Thistle and its Guardian Weed-Warrior ©CP'08

thistle
Outside. We went to see that cats at Frady's Landscape and Nursery on U.S. 40 just east of Cumberland yesterday and looked around. In the stone, gravel and landscaping area behind the tree part of the nursery we poked around some nice landscape element rocks and eventually bought a perfect 10 pounder and a few bags of cobblestones. These will be residing in the dry creek-bed element I am building in my back yard sanctuary. I have also added another natural element, well more like gained another natural element. Wild Flowers. I have lots of varieties of wild flowers (read weeds) and they are in several areas of the yard the showcase focal point. Since wild flower management is not nearly as fun or fulfilling right now as landscape architecture and design they have gotten a pass. Since over 90% of the physical landscape architecture labor demands and nearly 100% of the design plans have fallen on my shoulders I may allow the project supervisor (in fact almost all projects supervisor now that I think about it) to have a stab at wild flower management, removal, distribution and/or relocation. Who am I kidding, the supervisor chooses her own jobs, that's the beauty of the position at the top of the food chain. Well, back out to the bigger picture I shall return soon.

weed
The picture up top is my Exotic Asiatic Lilly showing off in front of the Echinacea. All the rest are weeds wild flowers: Two Thistles, and one six foot tall daisy-ish charmer fighting for pollination and sunlight.
So day two of the week off is in the books, I have to hit the All Star Bowling Alley here in a few and then Jenni and I are planning on taking in Wall°E.
I'll let you know how the bowling went.
Chuck Pace ©2008
The Battle Rages On...
Thursday the long awaited day off. Thursday I was ordered to be up and cogent at 7:00 AM. A cruel thing to do to a man's day off. But it was for the arrival of the cable company commandos that the order was so given. They arrived at 7:11 (and didn't bring slushies or hot dogs) determined that which I already knew. My in-house cable receiving equipment was tip top and the signal strength was aces. I, like my wife before me (even though she was on her way to work and not at all before me) recommended a look in the junction box outside where twice in our digital storied past comcastic commandos had put some sort of signal filter in for denizens of the cul-de-sac further down the road. Twice before this filter or filters disrupted our signal and caused us untold grief (can you say Colts Playoffs 2006?). Twice before a technician had danced with my A/V equipment and found it a worthy dance companion and then found the culprit to be lurking inside the junction box outside. I said such to the dynamic duo. Yes they sent two, one to subdue the angry customer who was lacking digital cable for a fortnight, and one to repair the problem I suspect. As I proposed the box solution and filter tampering they looked on with curious and circumspective gaze. They must have thought the consumer of a querulous nature but after about twenty minutes they came back in to announce, "Well there is a problem with that box (junction) and someone will be out later today or tomorrow to look at it, you do not have to be home and they don't need to come in." I took note of the use of "look at it" instead of "fix it", and signed their silly paperwork. 
6 Days Later...
Oh my god!!! It is still hit or miss, now every day that it rains the digital cable goes out completely, and it stays off for the better part of 24 hrs. We didn't get our full channel line up until Monday or Tuesday of this week, and since yesterday's pop-up storms we have been completely without digital cable again! If digital cable and HD are the current and future of cable then I think I would prefer a simpler time...

To Be Continued... yet again
Cable Guy
Another week is gone almost before it started. It seems like these days just fly by. But today is the equalizing day. Today after waiting since Last Sunday. The Cable guy is supposed to be here between 7:00 and 9:00. This will get the slow time back in the system. This will be like drinking powerade to replenishing the today after a hard active day. We have had computer access and non-digital cable at the other sets but the digital and HD have been out for most of the week. Here is the weird part. One of those really bad stormy days, when there were power outages and such, that day when the power came back on and we reset all the clocks. That day the digital cable was back on for the night. The next morning? Nada. So here we are not going to work on time. Here we sit, waiting for the technician or someone like him.

"Forgive me father, it has been 9 days since my last cyber-confession." My sin is one of time. I have wasted a little, lost a lot and never had enough. I have let people down and left them wandering in a desert of darkness about my shabby meager existence, I offer an act of contrition. I offer an apology. I offer this post as a foundation for light in the growing darkness.
I know it has been 9 days since I posted, I know many of you have been anxious. I know many of you have abandoned me all together, I know some things. I have been busy. I have been tested at the bowling arena and fond wanting. I have been working, and that has been hard. People off, people missing days, lots of people last minute remembering that they have fathers and there is a day to remember on the event horizon.

What has been the hold up? Weather and weather, wether you believe it or not.
Here is where I wanted to add a bunch of pictures of my work on the patio and the decking extensions I added, here is where I was going to a show some pictures of the flowers I bought and planted in pots and beds and such, after the decking was decked and just needed to be decked out in color.
Here is where I head back to the confessional of my mind and not to the cyber-attrition outlet mall. This time it is time again not weather but the continuity of existence and the requirements that that places on a linear being like myself. Maybe pictrures soon...



... maybe.
Chuck Pace ©2008

The Work Continues
Well, or should I say Hi-Ho, Hi-Ho. In 75 minutes my vacation will be officially over. Jenni said it was so at Midnight last but I beg to differ. I am my own man until I clock in I say, shoot, were I of a mind I could shoot off to Borneo or Kazakastan, or even Sri Lanka and just not return to the rigors of laboring for a wage at all. But no I am of a mind to survive and thusly I will be taking my place among the ranks of the gainfully employed again in some scant 75 minutes. Wish me well. That bag is now catless. Good day.

Chuck Pace ©2008

No News is Good News.
Maybe I should start every post with, Yesterday after work. Nothing happened yesterday after work. Work was the highlight of the whole day it was the slice of spam between the moldy bread of before and after work. I was busy, I ran my self ragged. Then I came home and looked under the wishmas tree to see if there was a miracle new car under it. Nope. No miracles for me. I surfed the web for about 90 minutes then I took my latest book and went to bed. I read for two hours, then rolled over (and over and over) and tried that escape clause known as repose. It didn't work. I woke up. No escape yet. Not only that, I woke just as poor and pathetic as when I finally dropped off the ethereal plane. Not better, not improved; just left with one fewer day on my car rental. Nothing happened yesterday or the day before for that matter which I could or would classify as good news, none of my news is of the good variety right now and thus no news (from me ) is good news (for anybody). I'll be seeing you on the sidewalks of life, wave and smile. I will too, outside anyway.

Chuck Pace © 2008 |
All The Way Down From The Hump
Here I am in the valley of the hump mountains of eternity. Like the undulating peaks and vales of the sea serpents back each perfectly spaced the weeks are a journeys from the valley of the weekend to the peak of the mid week, then the downhill climb back to the valleys, never ending never changing never altering in their consistency. This particular Saturday I am off from my job which I alternate every other Saturday with Michael Novak. I have been sleeping poorly again the last few days and took the luxury of sleeping in until almost 11:00 with but a brief interlude of dog walking at around 8:00 am. The day outside is gloomy. Grey sky chill and dead-brown earth patches between unmelted checkerboards of cold blue-white snow are the mute colors of late January. The house seems more like a holding cell than a haven from the dreary. The time clicks and ticks and slowly the midmorning is mid afternoon and midnight seems no more pleasant or welcome, that is unless I am asleep which may or may not be the case. If this is what it is like to have one week without football I can not happily await the absence of the game for the next 8 months. I will have other distractions for sure. and Vacations and such but the truth is those are just breaks in the scales of the sea-serpent. The bowling leagues of Friday and Sunday are two thirds decided, and only ten more weeks remain to see us through these distractions as well. Then of course the Nascar Sprint Cup season will be well underway, and the challenge of a Fantasy season competition will fall into those very valleys again for 36 weeks. But today all that seems so very far off in the distance. Too far to be counted on more like places or times of legend or mythology.
serpent

Chuck Pace © 2008 |

One off the Grid
In my categories I have nothing for total relaxation so I chose Toil It for todays. The theme of the categories is obviously the same as the site my regurgitation the events of the previous period since I last posted. This is just me being (or thinking that I'm) clever. Since I had a spa and sauna day yesterday I am going in the opposite direction for the Category. Here in detail is how I did nothing all day.

I awoke again at about 9:30 (I woke to Jenni's goodbye kisses before she went to work earlier), I did breakfast and then, made a pot of coffee in my carafe, put creamer in a thermal cup and took a handful of sugars into the chamber. I gathered my current book
"Blue Highways" by William Least Heat Moon, the laptop (Mobile Command center), cell phone, home phone and iPod Nano. I turned the wall mount heater up in the master bath and went to lazy land. At between 3 and 4:00 Charlie wanted to go walkies to make ploppies, I put on loose pants over my lounge pants I had been wearing, ear wrap, coats and went beyond the bedroom for the first time since breakfast. I got the junk from the mail-box, read it, made my own e style mail to people of all climates, paid some bills on-line and finally slept again. At 6:18 Jenni woke me for the third time in on day. I got up and we finished watching the first disk of the third season of Buffy.
I never put on my watch, and I didn't have the TV on until Jenni reemerged from the fog, but I always had a decent idea of the time from the internal chu-clock.

Boy that was as exciting as the first Transporter movie wasn't it!
Chuck Pace©2008
|
Only 5 at 6 on the 2nd
Another blanket would be nice. A hot cup of tea and some chicken soup. I talked to my folks in Old Town Florida last night. Warned them of the deepfreeze they are in for today, now. The projection for that part of the eastern states was 19° this morning. Five hundred miles further south in Stuart FLorida, Meredith is expecting low 30's. But here in central Indiana Mr. Freeze is out doing himself. The projected low last night (at least on some of the meteorological dart boards games) was 9°, well in deathly cold games of chance a 5 under is a loosing bet (and toes and fingers too if you are not lucky). That blanket? The fluffy white one that started in the wee hours of the 1st, the one that was stinging my face yesterday morning? That's not the blanket I was looking for.

What did you do on the 1st? Jenni and I had a marathon DVD session again, we had no choice but watch
The Bourne Ultimatum, obviously, then we watched the last 7 episodes of season two of Buffy the Vampire Slayer all the while huddled under blankets with lap cats and/or dogs as additional barriers to the cold air inside. Well' I need to wrap this up, wrap myself up and start the Mädchen and get her internals warming for about 10 minutes before I subject her to her first "out of garage" experience of 2008.

Don't for get to take your chill pills this morning. Have a good 2, I have 3 off again before working 4 and 5 to get to 6.
Chuck Pace©2008
|
The Current Rant of Exchange?
Friday Night. Big Mama and Lil' Darlin' picked me up at the sidewalk in front of The Store. As we rode home Jenni regaled me with more tales of 'the miracle system' how it only has a limited number of grace logins and that nobody is sure how to get on after the grace period is naught but an exclamation point. That is another thing that was left out of the training. She had talks with IT when the system started locking up, the IT guy said it would be like a virus. That each user would have the same problems and issues, and that he and his fellow IT cronies did not like the WMDS at all. Jenni waited. With in a few hours the same bog down and failure had hit a couple of the work stations in the land of putty and cloth cubicles. Tell It to IT, so they can track the 'progress' of change for change sake was the only advice that Jenni could offer the frustrated few on point over the 'tween holiday work week.
My Friday? Like many other days was unexceptional. The job doesn't change much in retail, that's why there are so few shows on TV or movies made about the exciting world of retail sales. Customers are a cross-cut of society. There are good ones, bad ones sincere ones who want to help, smart, dumb, helpless helpful and hateful ones. The difference between customers and people that you might just encounter is you rarely get to just walk away from the bad seeds and ass-hats when you are in retail. You have to try to help them on their journey, and you are often the speed bump. Many mistake the clerk for the devil, assume that you are ripping them off, just trying to push the bad stuff on them and saving the good stuff for who? Many come in from the internet world thinking that those 650 dollar cameras can be had for 300 and that the 'honest' web-retailers are not ripping them off but the actual location been in business 50 years stores are. Those can actually be fun, so can the ones who come in ready for a fight about an exchange or refund when we go, "O.K." and fix their problem. Watching them process the information that it is not a big uncaring corporation across the counter from them it is Chuck or Matt, Phil or Mike, Ken or Scott and we aren't anybody's enemy. I've seen people turn their heads sideways like a dog hearing it's first opera over a speaker, confusion, then slow-witted acceptance.
We don't have tables or numbers to draw for returns. We don't have a 'fill this out and show ID and then go to that guy over there in a whole different zip-code and he'll get you your money back' system. The guy who sold you the stuff is the guy who you get your exchange or refund from in almost all cases, but that is even an almost moot point at Roberts because for the most part we listen to and help with the process of buying so the returns are a very small part of our post-holiday experience anyway.
Chuck Pace©2007
|
But there is just no Time
I could talk about the wonderful party at Kays. They are always wonderful there. I could talk about the home stretch of shopping, but that is a given now. I could talk about missing family but that is too painful to dwell on. I could talk about the blur that is these last few days of December, or the constant wondering 'what day of the week is this' that happens when there is no sun in the morning and no sun in the evening, but that has been beat to death like...
The whole point of the holidays is to be with the ones you love, most of them are in Northern Florida, Southern Florida, Tennessee, and in our hearts. We will be with them all and we will be alone together at the same time. I could say sappy crap like that. I could I could, I could...
I could start the car an warm it up, I could take out the trash and I could go to work.

HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO ALL AND TO ALL A GOOD REST.
Chuck Pace©2007
|
Blink, maybe next year.
The Holiday season is in full swing. This weekend is the Multi-rep demo, which is exactly what it sounds like. It's true we have one sales rep who sells about 20 different product lines to us, but it is not just him. We will have multiple sales reps in the store hawking their wares, touting their unique differences and features, vying for the consumer dollar. We will not have an Wii's. Inventory that is the key. We have what we have, and getting more is going to be tougher with every terrestrial rotation. Come early, come often but don't come too late. 26 days. 23 more shopping opportunities, and we have the most popular, fastest moving cameras and accessories right now, but December means dwindling inventory. The X-mas eve shopper will be looking at the dregs, the early birds will have gorged on the fat worms of giftdom, and through it all there is one constant. One unfaltering (o.k. that's not true) constant. Me. This is my 19th December at Roberts, I am retail battle worn, scarred and hardened, I know the job at hand and I am prepared for the unexpected. Sure it could make others a little crazy to see what I've
retail_master
seen; the unseemly, sorrid, underside of human nature, greed, dishonesty, distrust. But I have an advantage, an ace up my sleeve. I was already crazy, and I know the product better than any part time seasonal, insincere make a holiday pay-check clark you might find in the big box stores. Ohh I'm brimming over with cheer, what?
Chuck Pace © 2007
|
Not Rage, Reporting
So there is much to tell of a substance-less account. I worked and tried to fix the ink area for well over an hour, did three sensor cleanings, sold a thing or two. That was after I got to the store of course, the way in had it's moment too. Just one really not the usual lane changing while putting on eye-makeup and talking on a hand held communication device type of moments that we all encounter more than we should. But one and one that mad me furious. I live less than a mile in three different directions from schools. My daughter attended two of them in her studies to become a state approved little bit older person. I hold the school zone speed limit as a sacred oath for her protection and the protection of everyone else's daughters and sons. The BMW comes from a land where they might want to cruise at 20 mph or 200, so it has a cruise control system that can be engaged at 20mph or 200. I set the thing at 25 when I enter the "zone" and do not err from that speed until I hit the back of the sign in the other direction. Here it is then. Yesterday as I entered the 'zone' I was alone on the road, three tenths of a mile back at the nearest intersection a Buick Rivera came around the corner. The school zone is 4 tenths of a mile long, and before one tenth had ticked off the in dash display the Buick was on my tail. "I said, Why don't I just put her in neutral and let you push me, buddy?" Jenni looked into the side-view and all she got was side, He was inches from my bumper. Then he started slowing and dropping back, then charging right to the back of the car over and over as I maintained the "zone' speed. Finally he did the unpardonable, with less than two hundred feet to the Speed limit 40 sign at the end of Warren Centrals Zone he passed me over the double yellow in a school zone line. So I thought I might start a Jerk of the week feature.
With three days left I think we have a clear cut winner here in episode one.
Brown Buick Rivera, paint peeling plate # 93T 5857.

I was going to talk about the Vodka's and the evening but there are no round tuits here so I will come back and do that tlater when I get a round tuit.
Chuck Pace © 2007
|
Miscellaneous Account, Miscellaneous Day
Morning.
I got the call at 5:54AM. My phone was calling me to awaken. I expected it. I programmed it to do so. I got up. I left the lights off and used the ethereal light from the phone display to find my way around the bed. I made it to the master bath. I master bathed in the shower. I selected socks, underwear and shirt in the Near Dark (no thanks to Kathyrn Bigelow) once again using phone to see my way to wardrobe. Dressed, I kissed the missus and drove to work.
Seventy.
The drive was fine. The morning was still thinking it was night there was little evidence of solar illumination. I took the nearly complete Super 70 corridor drive, there were no construction workers. She is all but done, and the Speed Limit signs are 55mph again. I set the cruise at 55, and rolled on. I arrived downtown at 7:05 AM
Impression of Dawn

Burr
Before I went to work I stopped at the Conseco Fieldhouse Starbucks. My Starbucks. Two of the three Stephanies that work at My Starbucks were there and I got a free grande water for being the only customer during their first hour open. The water is always free and I always get one but it was offered as a Free water this morning, I gladly accepted. The sausage breakfast sandwich was delicious although not free. I ate and read some of Philip Vail's account of "The Turbulent Life of Aaron Burr" in paperback, I planned on reading more, instead I looked out the window at the wind oh, and I plucked from my bag of tricks (there are no tricks in my trick bag, but there was a notebook) a notebook into which I recorded an impression (ink pen and roller ball delivery system impression to be exact) of the arrival of the light and the start of the day. Here I offer it to the world unedited.
11/17/07 8:03 AM
Watching the sky lighten as the sun comes up. I am looking
west from Starbucks. The dirty and drab streets gain contrast
as a wispy clouded sky presents itself. The blue and white
flags across the street move gently with the influences of a
light, northerly breeze. It is 37° and looking to be a pretty
day outside for anyone who has a pretty day inside state of
mind. I just want it to be over so I can go back to bed.

buxbimmr
I clean up my mess, get a refill on my coffee and drive to the store parking lot. I don't expect the day to be of any value to me at all. If it wasn't the Canon Demo day I would be off. I was scheduled off last year on Canon Demo day and have suffered for it ever since. I have heard dozens of times that it was the best single day we've ever had. That I could have made a boat of booty from Canon company spiffs and "Made my Month" all in just that one day. That is why I wasn't expecting history to repeat. At our pre-opening pep talk I noticed that I put the lid was back on my coffee with the sippy hole directly over the overlap seam which causes structural integrity loss and a seam channel that directs some of the java treat to the garment of the unlucky cup inverter. I created a vacuum seal on the straw to my free water by placing my finger tightly over the end, and dribbled water over a paper towel and addressed the residual effects of the loss of structural integrity mentioned above. Someone pointed, another smirked and Bruce and Phil looked and one said "What?" I looked up and said. "Nothing, just another bonus of being Chuck." Customers came and went. The day came and went. The ticket count rivaled that of last years record. The dollar amount about a third of that hallowed retail summit. History Never repeats.
Song time, "History Never Repeats", by Neil Finn, Split Enz, Wiatta
History never repeats
I tell myself before I go to sleep
Don't say the words you might regret
I've lost before you know I can't forget


There was a girl I used to know
She dealt my love a savage blow
I was so young, too blind to see
But anyway that's History

I say
History never repeats
I tell myself before I go to sleep
Don't say the words you might regret
I've lost before you know I can't forget

You say I always played the fool
Well I can't go on, if that's the rule
Better to jump than hesitate
I need a change and I can't wait

History never repeats
I tell myself before I go to sleep
And there's a light shining in the dark
Leading me on towards a change of heart

History never repeats, history never repeats
Chuck Pace © 2007
|
I heard someone repeat the, "Just another bonus of being Chuck" line. I'm Charlie Brown, Jerry Lewis and Gomer Pyle all rolled into one lest successful package, and boy ain't it a treat.
Cold but Fulfilling
pump process
Well my hands are cold, it is 38° out there right now and I had the garage door open to better see. Still the whole affair took less than an hour. The new pump popped right in and is working like a champ. I reprogrammed the date and time into the Mâdchens onboard computer and the radio codes since the battery was disconnected for over a week. She was so happy to get fuel that she purred like a kitten and asked "Bitte Herr, dürfen wir gehen auf ein Feld Reise?"("Please sir may we go on a field trip?"). Perhaps. I've been wanting to go Matthews to see their covered bridge, and I have a lot of time on my hands now that the car is running. Yes, why yes we can. I have to get out of these gassy smelling cloths and we are off.
Chuck Pace © 2007
|
Looking Up
As the holiday season stops creeping in and gets ready for its full on charge, I am at home on a
fuelish
day off. A much needed and perfectly timed day off too I might add. The ebay-ed pump arrived in the mail box yesterday and I will attempt to re-locate it to the fuel tank yet this morning. I have the experience of removing the old one and attempting to install the improper replacement, so the steps will go quicker with more assurance this time. The 'engineering' involved is already quite involved and impressing. I just have to reverse the steps of the removal of the improper item and re-seal the compartment. I head off to do that now, I will return momentarily.


Electric fuel pumps above, the old (dead), the new and the pre-pump filter.

Chuck Pace © 2007

|
More Bounty from Nature
Thurdsy pickins
L to R: Habenero,Anaheim,Cherry Pepper, A string of Cayennes, Jalapéno, Beef master and Cherry tomatoes, Eggplants and Squash
So it turns out that not all anaheim peppers are just slightly warm. Last night after I collected the beautiful garden harvest above I did what I've done a dozen times before. I picked a decent size anaheim pepper and ate it whole. It was hotter than the jalapénos! My lips were numb, and it felt like someone had cut the connection point of the underside of my tongue with a red-hot rusty dull serrated knife. So it is either the late harvesting, or the change in the weather in the last few days that has brought about this transformation in the garden of herbly delights. Time is not my friend today and I must go now, having slept through all my alarms and only awakened by the missus coming out of the shower and dropping the 80lb. version of The Deathly Hallows on the foot of the bed.

Chuck Pace © 2007
|

Harvest Noon
peppers
Cayennes, Anaheims, Jalapénos, Cherry Tomatoes and one Habenéro.Chuck Pace ©2007

philpace
It felt good to sleep in a bit. I got up at 9:30. Was outside gathering peppers and tomatoes an hour later. I've been straightening and washing cloths and most of all taking it easy in the heat. By now my parents should be back in Florida, they took a little vacation from retirement for a couple of weeks and visited with Mom's baby brother Jimmie and his family in West Virginia for a week, then headed up to Indiana and my brother Dennis' for another week. Saturday was the mildest day in a very long time and it couldn't have come at better time (between Friday and Sunday?). I had Saturday off they spent the day here. We all spent most of the time outside in the garden, I grilled and entertained and caught up a bit with the folks. I heard stories and such of Uncle Jim's kids, there are so many of them I don't even think I could name them all, two boy and six or seven girls, that I haven't seen since probably 1973 or 74. Mom was showing me pictures and saying this is so and so, and this is Calvin and this is Missy and Neil and Tammy's kids and I'm like wait. Which one is Neil? Tammy has Kids? Who is Calvin. So I got a very remedial acquaintance with my Uncle's family in the two dimension 4x6 sense. Calvin is Aunt Juanita's brother for all of you out there keeping score.
As I sit here doing this input thing the sky is alive with sound of jets practicing for the Air show this weekend, but every time I go outside to see if I can get a photo its a no show.
basil-bee
At the top under the header photo is a shot of my dad Phil Pace enjoying the climate in the garden. Directly above one of my gardening assistants checks the quality of the Basil I'm growing for cooking and especially Tomato Pies. Yum.

Chuck Pace © 2007
|

Not A Century By Half
50 years is a milestone in any endeavor. Especially when serving the public and making the community a better place to be, not as a volunteer or an elected person or a even man of cloth, but as a retail outlet. Most businesses that maintain for half a century are either small mom and pop shops, or become parts of larger corporations and lose their identity. Yesterday Roberts Distributors stood on the summit, and looked out and back on 50 years of retail, growth, and investment in itself, its employees and a community. I've been there since just after the 31st anniversary, saw the store go from a catalog showroom entity (like Service Merchandise) to Nationally recognized and respected camera store with connections to nearly all the 'big' players, shooters and imaging professionals out there. From a mom and pop where you could get your film, toaster, luggage and a nice wedding band, to a company where you could get the latest amateur, hobbyist or professional camera gear at competitive prices from a real person with more than just a passing knowledge of the operation and function of the product. Happy Birthday to Roberts. Many more happy anniversaries to come (I won't say returns, as that is a retail no-no).
Chuck Pace © 2007
|
Disappointment With, While Without
Argonaught
Forty One. That is the magic number. It looks great next to $389.78. It means about another 170.00. I don't have it. I can get it but it has to come from another part of a budget so full of holes that there will be suffering and added misery. I can't get it soon. But I need to.
Forty One is the number of miles I drove the Bimmer after the radiator and strut replacements before another problem reared its ugly head. I feel like Jason of the Argonauts fighting a four headed hydra, struggle to knock out one head and there are still 3 to fight and the sword is getting so heavy. Someone call Ray Harryhousen and tell him to give me a break. The new problem is in the same corner the brake disc is now rubbing in one spot as though severely warped. To the point that it feels like the whole corner is going to seize up and break. If I do the work myself it is about 119.00 for the rotor. and another 40.00 for new pads, with tax that about 170. Then I'll need to bleed (I am bleeding, I'm hemorrhaging actually, but it's green not red. Add 170 to the 389.00 I've already spent to get the struts and cooling and that is an expensive forty-one miles, well I had to drive another 12 miles with the thing seizing grabbing and shuddering on the right side (this applies equally to Jenni in the passenger seat and the disc brake assembly actually) after the brake started its terrorizing me. About $10.57 per mile (not counting fuel) since I picked up the car from BFM.
I need an economy car, a leather vest and a sword, and a half dozen argonauts, two eclairs and for glazed please. Well, Jenni is ready to give me a ride in in the truck. Work calls duty calls. But Misery won't hang up for me to answer the other calls. Leave a message I'll get back to you.
There may be no golden fleece
but human riches I'll release
oh, my head is spinning like the world
and it's filled with beasts I've seen,
let me put my bag down
and I'll tell you it all right from the start.
like the scarlet woman who would pick on the boys
she thought were green, and the two faced man
who made a hobby of breaking his wife's heart.
seems the more I travel, from the foam to gravel,
as the nets unravel, all exotic fish
I find like jason and the argonauts
there may be no golden fleece
but human riches I'll release.

I was in a land where men force women to hide
their facial features,
and here in the west it's just the same
but they're using make-up veils.
I've seen acts of every shade of terrible crime
from man-like creatures, and I've had the breath
of liars blowing me off course in my sails.
seems the more I travel,
from the foam to gravel, as the nets unravel,
all exotic fish
I find like jason and the argonauts
there may be no golden fleece
but human riches I'll release.
I have watched the manimals go buy---buying shoes,
buying sweets, buying knives.
I have watched the manimals and cried
buying time, buying ends to other peoples lives.

jason and the argonauts
there may be no golden fleece
but human riches I'll release.

Chuck Pace © 2007
|
Wanted to.

The day to day grind. That may be the reason. Nope, time is not the culprit (in any real sense). The truth is I just mismanaged the time I had to me last night and over spent at the sleep-bank this morning. That and an eminent drop off. The drop off that is eminent is the German Girl at Black Forrest Motors. In February I had to have the radiator replaced there (at BFM) and during this overwhelming string of really hot days she has started to loose fluids. We all know how fluids are critical when it is in the 90's, well it is no different for her. I think there may be a leak in the base of the radiator, they are going to check, so I have to drop her off this morning, catch a ride with Jenni, and hope for a equitably feasible financial solution to the coolant conundrum. The end result is a shorter posting effort this AM. Apologies. They are mine. Luck, Love and Joy be with you.
Chuck Pace © 2007
|

After 6, I'd Like Seconds Please
How many times did I hit the snooze. Another night without many z's in the sleep bank. I tossed and turned, beat up a pillow, and tormented in a horizontal torture chamber. Finally after two hours I packed it in and went to the couch. The tocks reigned havoc on the ticks and the battle ensued, Somewhere after 2:30, with Charlie laying on my feet I entered the sleep chamber of horrors only to start whacking the snooze button on the alarming cellular mere seconds later, or maybe it was a scant handful of hours, or maybe it never happened. 'Twasn't enough, M'lord, I barely crashed before the somnambulance driver had me on my feet again. I can't say I dreamed, there was no time, more like I schemed, conspired with the alarm for a scant few more seconds, since my first course was so insubstantial. I got my just deserts. But just deserts are not enough to sustain. Is this making any sense? I don't know let me sleep on it. I'm still struggling to crawl to the surface of reality although I'm sitting here typing, most of the moment is draining through a colander of coherence, and it feels like I'm (or my mind is) as much asleep as alive right now. Soon I expect the switch to be thrown, and intelligible thought to follow. In any case I'll need a new switch, I should have never thrown that one, I could have flipped it, but I had no interest in seeing what it looked like from a different perspective, I didn't want to see it at all.
More time, snooze. Snooze time. Damn, that was not ten minutes I barely sat the accursed instrument of my resurrection back on the table. SNOOZE, it must be broken. When I was a youth and I had transgressed a boundary or rule my mother would sometimes begin my punishment with this phrase, "Get a knife out of the kitchen drawer and go cut me a switch, to whip you with." The horror of being the tool of deliverance for your own punishment is often more punishment than the lashes received, this was the case again as I stumbled to the door frame and actuated the switch from light to dark, allowing spark to tungsten filament unabated and illuminating a dwelling outside a still dark and clouded mental landscape, still praying for more time. Give me... , aww I'm awake now time to get ready for a foray into to the world of commerce, perhaps I'll buy a little time and tick it in my sleep bank. I have to go apologize to a pillow. I'll see you in the sleep hazed dream that is your reality, mine's busted.
Do I hear Louis Armstrong playing "Dream A Little Dream of Me" ?
DREAM A LITTLE DREAM OF ME
(W. Schwant / F. Andre / G. Kahn)
Yes, stars shining bright above you
Night breezes seem to whisper "I love you"
Birds singin' in the sycamore trees
Dream a little dream of me, yes

Say nighty-night and kiss me
Just hold me tight and tell me you'll miss me
While I'm alone and blue as can be
Dream a little dream of me

Stars fading but I linger on dear
Still craving your kiss
I'm longin' to linger till dawn dear
Just saying this, yes

Sweet dreams till sunbeams find you
Sweet dreams that leave all worries behind you
But in your dreams whatever they be
Dream a little dream of me

------ instrumental break ------

Yes, stars fading but I linger on dear
Still craving your kiss
I'm longing to linger till dawn dear
Just saying this, yes

Sweet dreams till sunbeams find you
Sweet dreams that leave all worries far behind you
But in your dreams whatever they be
Dream a little dream of me
Yes, dream a little dream of me

Chuck Pace © 2007
|

Zombies Arise!
Zombies arise! I'm too old for this... I don't know how many times Roger Murtaugh (Danny Glover) says that in the first Lethal Weapon movie, but I think I understand why he says it. I'm still trying to recover from a week old multi-race weekend, and I don't really know when I'm going to get enough sleep to get that done. There is always something keeping me from the oh so needed rest cycle, The Chatterbox, bowling, insomnia, work, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, insomnia, Crambone, insomnia. I've gone to bed by 10:00 the last three nights and still not woken refreshed. I may be like an old nicad battery, the ones that just lose their ability to maintain power, or never recharge fully after so many uses. I'm definitely on the downward side of the bell curve of middle age, I think I'll be o.k. for a while but soon it starts to get really steep. Steep,sleep deep sleep sheep sheep sheep... zzzzz.
The funny thing here is I was talking too Rich at work yesterday and he is struggling as much a I am, and he's ten years younger than I. Jack Green, Bill Brooks and I were talking about this too on Wednesday when I stopped in for a couple at the box, at 88 Jack still gets it done, while Brooks and I were talking about not feeling our age, or accepting that we are our age. Well, we may never grow up, but getting up from bed may become a little more difficult. I fell asleep in 'the chair' watching a 'taped' episode of rescue me on Wednesday night. That is rare for me. Maybe a sign of things to come.
Tonight at Clancey's there is another Crambone show. These are shows. I don't say Crambone is playing, these are shows. The lead singer Jeff is just a little crazy, and you never know what he's going to do next. I tell stories of the things he's done at the three shows I've attended, and I here even more outrageous tales from the ones I've missed. Mercifully I have saturday off and may get to sleep until noon. I hope I get to sleep until at least 10. o.k. 8. Well what ever sleep I get will be welcomed, and will end too soon. I'm done here I've got to take some vitamins.
Sorry there are no pictures, I got too late to work on that. I don't know maybe I'm still a little groggy. What was the post about today?
I don't remember.

Chuck Pace © 2007
|

Entering The Waters Again
"For my own part I have never had a thought which I could not set down in words with even more distinctness than that which I conceived it." Edgar Alan Poe.
Modern Cleaners
So my missus tells me that she misses the daily post, the rambling writings, and the boarding pass to my flights of passing fancy. I admit that it is cathartic at times to sit and roll with the moment at keyboard and LCD, but there are so many times when I have nothing really to say that it seems a great waste of effort. The work of wordsmithing, if not physically exhausting is still very difficult and requires diligence and mental fatigue at times. I identify with the quote from Poe above from his "A Dream Within a Dream" and truly feel I can almost achieve a level of eloquence, or "distinctness" at the keyboards far better than my clumsy tongue can ever manufacture. I am an aside (adding my thoughts in the stream of...) kind of guy when I type just as I am an aside kind of guy when I talk, but rarely do I stumble over the words that are manufactured from the digits instead of the palate. Even having said this, if I am to get back into the rhythm of daily puking of thoughts I feel I should have some content worthy. More than just remunerating bowling scores or attendees at the local watering hole. I'm sure that I will still do plenty of that, too much for many tastes I'm sure, but I wish for a clarity of purpose or at least a direction to my missives. The other day I sat for two hours and wrote a travel piece with pictures and details that was lost in a laptop lock-up that could only be rectified with a reboot. The damn thing locked up as I was trying to save it. How frustrating. I have yet to recreate that post, since the spontaneity of creation is lost in redeux, and the originality forced. I rarely have a direction when I sit to task at computer and blog. It is as new to me as it is to dear reader when I have finished, even if it is a recap of a horrible or fabulous even at kegeling. Yet I feel I must recapture that posts spirit if not its majesty (such as it were). So I will tell that tale again soon. I have the pictures reloaded, and saved, and with their baptism I shall see them rise again (from keystroke and screen) my brothers and sisters.
The photo above is from Lebanon, and the trip I mentioned above. It is symbolic of my need to get back to the task. To be current and Modern in my posings. Many of you have asked for it, now you are going to get it.

Chuck Pace © 2007
As "Modern" as Richard Morris' 1967 musical comedy, "Thoroughly Modern Millie"
|

Busy Day in the 90's
Hi There, got nuts?
Work , work. work, work, work. Hello boys(and girls) did you miss me? I was up at 9 yesterday, out the door for errands by 9:15, and back from all my running (o.k. driving) by 10:20, from then on it was yard projects (one of which meant tearing up the world HQ), mowing, cleaning and such, planting and watering and basic yardening until about 4:15 when, I had to go get something to eat. I was dizzy and trembling, and suffering from heat prostration I'm sure. The wind was something fierce yesterday too, it ripped my trumpet vines off the side of the house, and broke one of the lesser limbs of my tulip tree. Gads.
Shifting gears: On wednesday Jenni and I stopped at Wendy's for lunch and took the fast food to Garfield Park, where we were harassed by squirrels. Three separate ones watched us eat, one bold one came and sat on the bench a couple of feet from Jenni,. We tried to give him a piece of lettuce from a sandwich, and he was having none of it, then Jenni tried a fry, and that fit the bill nicely. Pretty soon he was coming up and taking fries right out of our hands, while we warned the bushy tailed rodent that these were empty hollow calories, he none the less insisted on begging several more during our visit. I was lucky to have my camera and got a few good shots of our lunch company.

Chuck Pace © 2007
|

Spring Demo
receiving line
The Receiving Line? Matt hopes they enjoy the Chafing Dish. Chuck Pace © 2007
blossomsm
The all vendor spring demo is over, the Canon specific demo is in the offing. This weekend was the absolutely worst weather for a demo, the skies were azure and cloudless, the temperatures were in the 70's and the camera geeks and buyers were smitten with springs blush. Sure there were a few takers, but many more avoided the downtown proper because of the umptenth annual firefighters convention downtown and throughout our fair micro-metropolis. I worked saturday and was busy with as much infrastructure and camera sensor cleanings as I was with sales. There is not as much room up front for an all out rep assault as there was in the old configuration, but those who could horn in got theirs.
Sunday was a stunner. What a dish Mother Nature gave us. Jenni and I worked in the yard for over an hour then I grabbed a book (Next, by Michael Crichton) and spent a little more time with the lovely weather before it was time to shower and then hit the bowling alley for the "Nothing Better To Do" Finale. Team "Mel 'N' Them went in two behind the 6th place team and two in front of the 8th team firmly in 7th we won 4 points and lost four points and most likely stayed 7th. Jenni subbed for Wil/Mel and David , Rich and I rounded out the evenings adventure.
appleblossom
This morning I grabbed a few shots of the Apple Blossoms in bloom in the back yard, and of course had the song "Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White"by The Harmonicats playing in my head the entire time, it was and is lovely like the day before and behind us. Enjoy.
Chuck Pace © 2007
|
Getting There
camerafixtures
The new camera dept. with some of its fixtures, Chuck Pace © 2007
dan-floorman
The store continues to change and adapt to the new surfaces, spaces and arrangement. The employees continue to adapt to the same thing, while many of the regular customer will walk right by the new camera location on their way back to the older ingrained area like Pavlovian Photographers. I even had one customer stop at one of my rare sojourns in the camera area and say to me, "Hey aren't you in the wrong area, aren't you supposed to be the cameras in the back?" I won't say who that was but he has the same last name as at least one of the Three Stooges. I thought, "There is that keen observational eye that most good photographers have", but said, "I am in cameras, the SLR's are right here behind me, see?" I say a rare sojourn because I've spent more time in the last two weeks moving, lifting, sliding, tilting, unstacking and stacking, stacking and unstacking, arranging and changing than I have in or around cameras, camera sales or camera customers, that's the way it has been for several of us, and of course sales have suffered, and commissions are omissions
rich corner revisited
for the few who are commission pay based. I thought this would happen, and it looks like it will continue in some for or another even after the rearrangement is final.
Tomorrow after work its home to pack, then bowling. After that we attempt a few hours of sleep then dash down and over to Bristol Tennessee for Nasca r Racing in the fishbowl. Travis and Mike W. are joining Rich and I at the track, and our personal driver John Qualkenbush is driving us there in his motor home. I expect the place to look a little different when we return, but not as much as if we had stayed, since Rich has applied most of the muscle and construction savvy. Not to mention relocating all the hardware. I think most of the changes when we return on Tuesday will be of a location of inventory and equipment nature, with 80% of the grunt work being done, but 20 % of the staff already. The photos above are of Dan the Floor man and Rich's old office corner continuing to evolve. The inevitable change even comes to Roberts, it just had to take the scenic route.
new jewels
The refurbished jewelry area, I wonder what Bob is looking at? Chuck Pace © 2007
Chuck Pace © 2007
|
Projects and Improvements
I-70
Not Many Rushers for the Hour, Pre-Construction area. Chuck Pace © 2007
Just a little over a week into Super 70, I am excited to see the changes and improvements, I normally would take I-70 from the far east side to downtown and back after work about 80% of the time. Right now I've been on I-70 twice since returning from vacation, both times in the waning daylight hours after rush hour traffic would be long gone. The traffic has slowed a lot, and the work seems to be going pretty quick, but, we shall see.
front floor
Floored between Friday and Monday. Chuck Pace © 2007
As momentous as the Super 70 project is, the more amazing one is right down-town at Roberts. The laminate flooring has started to go down in the front, and the effect is immediate, the place looks warmer and more modern. Why shouldn't, I think that Bob and Rose took the old carpet from an Egyptian temple when Pharoah released the hebrews and set them to wander into the desert with Moses. I have started documenting this change too, and plan to present the store with a collection of shots when the process reaches fruition.
cameras
New Camera Central. Chuck Pace © 2007
I of course will keep you posted, so to speak.
Next we make bricks without straw, where's you're God now Moses?
Chuck Pace © 2007
|
be-leaguered
swingin' cover
Yesterday, almost as nice at Florida weather yesterday, Swingin'! Chuck Pace © 2007
Yesterday was a beautiful day, I grilled out and made a whole new experimental marinade for pork chops, yum. I will have to remember what and how much of what I put in that marinade. It was awsome. Then there was the Nascar race from Las Vegas. ? I don't know what happened. I led the fantasy league until there were only 19 laps left. That's when Jeff Burton's battery stopped charging and he started falling back. He was looking for a caution to change put the battery, unfortunately for me he got one four laps later. When poll sitter Kasey Kahne lost control and backed hard into the wall and finished his day, and mine. Congratulations to Ed Sipes for his fantasy racing win. So I really do know what happened, but I was looking forward to a another big win.
Today it's back to work, where they started putting down the laminate flooring on Saturday evening, I can't wait to see how much they got done.
Chuck Pace © 2007
|
Time Passages
pre-destruct
Al Stewart Anyone? Nope. Renovation at Roberts. I started in 1988. The carpet on the floors had started a few years earlier. The show cases were old and wooden, the primary mode of merchandise display was gondolas in the aisles. We were a catalog showroom. Well lots of things have changed, and lots of things have stayed the same. By this time next week just about everything will be different. The changes when they do happen are usually dramatic. Like the building of the photo-lab, or the
Frame Office
addition of the the warehouse an d loading dock. But the most sweeping (and mopping) changes are just about to happen. The carpet, which is so old and faded, is about to be replaced by laminate wood flooring. Bruce recently mad the comment that removing the carpet could cause a collapse in the building, he figures after 20+ years the carpet has become a structural member, a load bearing element. On the album Pyramid, The Alan Parsons Group aptly says,
tumbling down
"What goes up must come down, what must rise must fall." Such is the case with the first managers office, come e-bay office come scrap pile yesterday. "Ch-ch-ch changes turn and faced the strain... " David Bowie. "Strange days indeed, most peculiar momma..." John Lennon.
The scary thing is how fast almost twenty years working at Roberts can be erased both physically and figuratively. The knocking down of walls and moving of cases makes tomorrow a new day with a new outlook, and something different. Of course in 6 months it will seem like it's always been the way it is going to be in a few weeks. Such is the nature of repetitive behavior and unchanging patterns.
Chuck Pace © 2007
|
After a Long Absense
Proctorfambly
Scott, Anni and Lex at the store on Tuesday last, Chuck Pace © 2007
So after what seemed like an eternity (9 days) I am partially able to post again. Partially; because there have been some major changes, for one the photo album is gone. For another I've built an archive 05-06 link to make the upload quicker, and less prone to instability. I will revise the photo album soon, with new and old photos alike, and update the stuff as I can. I already had one crash today after my first success in over a week. How was even the marginal victory achieved? I moved everything back to the mobile command center, since tomorrow after work Jenni, Meredith and I will be going mobile. First to Tennessee for a very brief stop and recoup before the long drive to Old Town Florida. I am up too late right now, and there is no way I can catch anybody up in one post anyway, suffice it to say, I've bowled, repaired cars, shoveled an olympic sized pools worth of snow and ice, and enjoyed having my daughter here for almost 5 weeks. David has flown up from Florida for Valentines day and returned, the car has had her hiccups cured, and the Nascar season has returned. There has been one race, and one winner so far, in the race it was Kevin Harvick, in the fantasy league it was me.
There has been two more Pacers in trouble, Anna Nicole has bought the big Air-Head Ranch in the sky, Lost has been found and Smallville continues to be awesome.
Anni Hood has become Mother hood after birthing a very handsome micro Scott (yes even smaller than the original), and Alexander 'Lex' Thomas Scott Proctor has made a visit to the Store and C. Scott has returned to work after a little more than a week off. Life goes on and I go south to retrieve some of my sanity. Wish me luck, I've been without it for quite a long time.
So I have to ask, has the heart grown fonder?
Chuck Pace © 2007
|